


five things that changed after touou lost

by atsueshi



Series: after this [7]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Gen, OTP Battle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-28
Updated: 2014-02-28
Packaged: 2018-01-14 01:39:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1247950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atsueshi/pseuds/atsueshi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one in which everybody freaked out because Daiki was actually much more tolerable after the match against Seirin, and all his wrinkles were suddenly gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	five things that changed after touou lost

_i. sleep_

     The night of their game and loss against Seirin was the first time in a very long time that he found himself unable to sleep for the right reasons. It wasn’t a nice change, but it was a welcome one; it was better than all those nights spent thinking of ways to not get bored. Not that it was easy, though: his heart settled uneasily in his chest, his breathing was laboured, and his mind went into overdrive, frequently wandering off to fragments of the match. He wondered where he went wrong, wondered where he fumbled and lost control, wondered what weakness there was that had caused his defeat. It took him a while to acknowledge that perhaps yes, Kagami was strong... but in the end Daiki knew it wasn’t really just Kagami who was stronger.

     In fact, Kagami was probably more or less on Kise’s level, hardly enough to beat him in a one-on-one. It just so happened that Kagami was backed by the one person who was and had always been stronger than Daiki _._

    (Those thoughts always brought back the stronger memories of that stupidly awkward fist bump request; Daiki could deny it all he wanted, but he was definitely lying when he told Tetsu it was going to have to be the last one.)

 

 

 

  _ii. shoes_

    Satsuki went shopping with him for basketball shoes, and was more patient and jolly with him than usual. She hummed and talked a lot in between choosing new models, and sometimes she even sang under her breath, but it wasn’t until she started giving advices about his shoe choices that Daiki realised something was probably amiss.

     “Why are you so happy?” he finally asked after Satsuki gave him the fourth pair she picked from the shelf. “You usually complain when I go out to buy shoes.”

     “You should try these on,” she replied, ignoring his query. “I looked these up last night, it’s got gel soles and pretty good shock absorbers. Five layers of glorious material. There’s a newer one out but it’s only being sold in the States for now, but if you want we could order it online, I found a good, reputable merchant store—”

     “You  _researched_  shoes last night?”

     Satsuki nodded eagerly. “I also looked into shoe designs and proper builds for wearing specific kinds of shoes.” She went on to babble about how he had been buying the wrong sort of shoes for walking and general casual use, and occasionally left his side to grab another pair for him to try on, overwhelming him with information on shoe structures and aerodynamics and shit he’d really rather not care about. After six hours, Daiki had purchased four new pairs; Satsuki was still in high spirits despite spending the entire day with him looking for shoes all over towns, and when Daiki asked again, for the umpteenth time, why she was so happy, and she finally replied, Daiki still didn’t know what to make of it.

     “You bought new shoes,” she said. “And treated me to food.”

     When morning came, her meaning finally reached him, and if he smiled a little at how silly she had been for being so happy over such a small thing, no one would have known.

 

 

 

  _iii. practice_

     He heard Imayoshi loud and clear, and it annoyed him to no end. It was the fifth time he asked the question out loud to Satsuki, who just clutched her clipboard and smiled and nodded in reply.

     “Momoi-chan, you sure this is the same guy we scouted just last April?”

     Daiki gritted his teeth at the disbelief in Imayoshi’s voice, but focused instead on the last ten suicides he should be making then. He saw Satsuki grin and nod, replying eagerly to Imayoshi who looked like he was seeing a ghost.

     “Shame,” he heard the guy say when he finished his drills. “I can’t believe this happened right after I retired. Would’ve been easier if he was like this all along.”

     “Don’t you have studying to do?” Daiki angrily spat at Imayoshi, who looked at him and smiled. “You’re being annoying, senpai.”

     Imayoshi chuckled and approached him, standing on tiptoes to look him square in the eye. “You really  _are_  Aomine-kun?”

     “Oh, fuck's sake, you people need to stop!” Daiki moved away from where Imayoshi and Satsuki were laughing at him, started his laps around the court while ignoring Imayoshi’s voice calling out to him about “what happened to the bratty Aomine-kun” and “is Kuroko-kun a fairy” and by  _gods_  if this was going to happen every single day he chose to train and train hard then he might as well just  _quit_.

     He said as much to Satsuki on the way home, but she just ignored him and started dishing out practice menus for him to try. He listened patiently despite the lingering annoyance at her and Imayoshi-san, because it was still a nice feeling to have been drenched in sweat, with his muscles aching and sore from all the hard training he had done, and Satsuki always knew what exercises were best for him.

     Wasn’t quite the same though, not without his long-time training partner, but he’ll take what he can get.

 

 

 

_iv. matches_

     Even though they still always won, it was nice to be able to go all-out against his opponents in the next few practice matches that came. All his inhibitions seemed to have left him, and even though they almost always doubled the score, his opponents wore smiles on their faces and never once gave up, perhaps uplifted by Seirin’s fighting spirit during the Winter Cup, and it was so fulfilling that when going home after every match, Daiki would animatedly talk about what happened in full detail to Satsuki, who was only too happy to humour him.

     Sometimes he’d even text Tetsu about it, and  _that_  would lead to long nights spent texting each other and holding conversations over the phone about things that they would probably never get to talk about in person. Still, it was better than the silence he’d sadly grown accustomed to during their long estrangement.

 

 

 

_v. eyes_

     Daiki saw everything in new light. During practices he realised that Wakamatsu was actually a fearsome captain, and Ryou was too sharp for his own good, and the other first years were set to train even harder than before. Not long after, Daiki started warming up to the rest of his team, and the changes he saw happening didn't scare him at all. It was actually fun to be with his team mates, and even though they still lost pathetically to him during one-on-ones and mini-games, they were so determined to beat him.

     It was on their eleventh mini-game that Daiki noticed what it was that made him so happy about playing against them: they all had Tetsu’s eyes. The fierce blaze of determination shone clearly through the gazes of his team mates as they marked him or executed a perfectly-timed screen, and it was there in the way they went up against him when he was on defence. It was exhilarating to Daiki to know that he was fighting five versions of Tetsu all at once, and though they weren’t anywhere close to the real thing—Tetsu _was_ one of a kind after all—Daiki was happier than he had ever been since coming to Touou. He’d often catch Satsuki looking at him while he played, and he doesn’t miss the way her eyes would go all teary; sure, it was a little miffing because  _why_  she cried about it Daiki would never understand, but he had long since realised how much pain he had put Satsuki in, and he knew she deserved to see him looking happy, so he stayed happy.

     When he was with Tetsu, however, playing with and against him and Kagami during their free days, Daiki often thought that nothing could hardly compare to the way Tetsu’s eyes looked, all raging willpower and focus, and Daiki would never say it to anyone (not even himself), but it was Tetsu’s eyes he missed the most.


End file.
